Song and Ravage
by L. Mouse
Summary: Complete novella. A prequel to An Adjustment of Plans. Soundwave's back story. Ravage is a deadly cybercat, and Song is a child by law, too young to bond to a symbiont. However, Ravage is also completely and desperately alone in the world. Only Song sees him as a friend. To others, he is a savage mechanimal or a prize symbiont who should only be bonded by an adult warrior.


Song and Ravage

This is a total AU, nominally set in G1 with elements of Prime. It is a prequel to an Adjustment of Plans. I originally wrote this for myself several months as an exercise in developing "my" vision of Soundwave and carrier culture for an Adjustment of Plans.

I do have some stories (in very rough draft) set in this same continuity. If you'd like me to clean them up and post them, please let me know. If enough people are interested, I'll get them posted.

(However, please remember that I write very slowly as it's difficult for me to type for long periods, and I've yet to find a voice writer that doesn't suck, particularlywhen it comes to editing things. I won't be able to immediately produce them, though I'll certainly add them to my to-do list if there's enough interest.)

The next couple of chapters of Adjustment of Plans should be posted soon. I just need to edit them a bit more.

Scraplets.

Song knelt, carefully hidden behind an outcrop of an ancient metal wall, and watched the swarm with calm, careful attention. They had killed something large - perhaps even a city-dweller who'd wandered too far into the badlands - and were having quite the feast. Even at this distance, he could hear the grinding of metal on metal as they consumed their kill's exoframe and the sloppier noises and frantic squeals when they located energon lines or oil reservoirs.

Scraplets were not his favorite prey, but the tribe needed fuel. This swarm would do.

Taking careful aim, Song lifted his wrist-mounted rail gun up and then quickly dropped a handful of steel pellets into the padded hopper one by one. He'd learned that, when hunting scraplets, to aim first and then load his weapon. Even though the reservoir for his ammunition was padded, the pellets unavoidably clanked together when he moved, and occasionally the sudden sharp noises were enough to overwhelm his sound dampeners. Therefore, he carefully loaded the gun after it was aimed to avoid detection.

His sound dampeners worked best on steady noises like the whine of his cooling fans, the growl of his power plant, or the hum of hydraulics and charging capacitors. Sharp noises were harder to counter.

He had a plasma cannon mounted on his shoulder that was effective in taking out large numbers of scraplets at once, but that was purely for defense. It was an energy intensive weapon, and charred scraplets weren't much good for salvage.

With a SFFFFT of air, he fired the first steel pellet with perfect aim at the closest scraplet. Their kill zone was tiny. Too high and he'd miss the creature's minescule CPU. Too low, and he'd breach their energon tanks and render the kill pointless. There was a sharp metal thunk-crumple noise, nearly inaudible over the louder cacophony of the feeding frenzy on the downed creature. The scraplet collapsed without so much as a twitch.

In efficient, rapid succession, he picked off scores more. Scraplets were stupid creatures, and none noticed the quick dwindling of their numbers or that something was killing them even as they ate. The sound of pellets striking their pack members was drowned out by the noise of their frenetic feeding. His caution in handling his ammunition prevented any significant sound from coming from his direction.

By the time Cybertron's white dwarf sun glittered just above the horizon, there were no more moving scraplets. He'd killed ninety-seven, which by any measure was a respectable harvest. This meant almost a hundred fewer to threaten the children and symbionts of the clan (or in large swarms, even adult carriers). Unfortunately, it meant almost a hundred bodies to clean. He'd killed too many to carry them back intact, so he would have to clean them here. It would be a tedious job at best, and one the symbionts would normally have done.

He tried to comm the camp in hopes of summoning assistance, but only got squealing static. This far out into the badlands, during the day, and in the high polar latitudes, communication was iffy at best. There was a tremendous amount of radio interference from Cybertron's sun.

It looked like he was on his own for the chore.

For a moment, he stood, listening to the silence. When he quieted his systems and his processor and listened with his spark, he sensed nothing with a processor sophisticated enough for emotions. Unfortunately, his talent for detecting the sparks of others didn't extend to such primitive creatures as sparklets. It was also unreliable as he didn't have the drivers installed to fully take advantage of his detection hardware and wouldn't until he reached his full legal majority in a few orns.

Wary of movement that might signal a living scraplet, he approached their kill. He kicked some of the dead scraplets aside, revealing the skeletonized remains of a mech. There wasn't much left of the corpse. Scraplets generally wouldn't eat struts - they were too dense - but consumed everything else with voracious enthusiasm.

He pulled the corpse free of the mass of dead vermin, and checked it for any salvageable parts. He was not sentimental about the process. The mech wasn't anyone he knew. The frame size matched no one in his databanks. Even if he was an acquaintance, however, his identity no longer mattered once he was one with the Allspark. The bottom line was that this was a harsh land, and nothing was ever allowed to go to waste. Every part he could save was one that he might use for repairs for himself or friends and family.

Unfortunately, scraplets were brutally efficient and there weren't many usable bits left, other than the struts themselves and a few circuits within the pelvic girdle that the scraplets hadn't been able to get to. This meant that there was no way to determine identity, and no way to notify next of kin. The mech would be just another anonymous soul lost to the badlands.

Song shook his head. Because of the sturdiness of his struts, Song wondered if he was a military mech - which would mean that he was city raised. City mechs were so very foolish. He suspected that the mech had entered the badlands with insufficient fuel, a lack of knowledge of appropriate shelters and inappropriate weapons.

Newcomers inevitably camed with massive blasters, laser rifles, or plasma cannons, plus fancy gadgets like invisibility cloaks and force shields. All consumed too much energy for this starved land, were prone to malfunction, and created high levels of heat. Scraplets could see infrared, which meant it took a remarkably complex invisibility cloak to hide from them.

He could see blaster marks on the rocks around the kill site, so the mech had been armed - but his blaster fire would simply have drawn more vermin in. The blaster had been consumed; all that was left was a few inedible bits of silica in the form of glass and well-chewed circuit boards.

It was better to kill silently than blow up the landscape with a high power weapon. If you couldn't kill silently, it was best to kill fast and flee faster. Vermin were not completely stupid, and the sound of a blaster meant combat and combat meant potentially wounded survivors or carrion. The noise of a fight inevitably drew scavengers and lower level predators.

He surveyed the frame again, and revised his guess as to the mech's original purpose. The mech had been large, broad through the chest, and heavily framed. This could conceivably be a body of another carrier, though not one he recognized. The mech was too tall and powerful for anyone he knew. While all carriers tended to be large mecha, few were this one's height unless they city born.

He decided he would return later for it after talking with the other tribes. There was nothing left for the scavengers. Odds were, it would still be here when he came back. If this was a carrier, his kin would have rights to the salvage and there was value in struts. It would be wrong to steal from the dead mech's kin.

He turned his attention to his scraplet kills, after a final slow survey of his surroundings. The noise they had made killing the mech could have drawn in other predators - though there wasn't much that was willing to tangle with a frenzied band of feeding scraplets. Anything with sense would have headed in the other direction.

There were a few vermin with more appetite than common sense, however. Both diggers and additional scraplet bands might be drawn by the sound of the fight and subsequent noisy consumption of the carcass. His reflexes were set to a hair trigger response as he finally crouched to begin the task of processing his kills.

The scraplets themselves were the size of two fists together. They were inconsequential alone, but deadly en mass. Unfortunately, they only seemed to come 'en mass'. Their rapid rate of reproduction and ability to survive on almost anything (though they preferred living creatures) was a double edged sword. While deadly dangerous, they were also one of the clan's primary and most valuable sources of energon.

He pulled an molecular knife from his subspace, and expertly slit through the duryllium shell of the first scraplet. There were a few bits that were useful for trade. He efficiently removed the optics, denta, and what was left of the CPU, and set these parts aside. The optics and CPU both contained rare precious metals that the clan would extract. The razor sharp denta were made of the exact same alloy as Cybertronian struts, and were in demand by both weapons makers and by Cybertronian medics.

From his subspace he next pulled an empty energon storage cube, and a bucket. After pulling a fine network of neural lines from the dead scraplet's tiny protoform with a skilled twist of his fingers, he cut the flexible, silver metallic flesh from its attachment point on the fuel tank. The tiny spiderweb of neural lines and a very tiny attached spark chamber went in its own pile. The neural lines contained substantial amounts of copper and the spark chamber was made of the same matrix as all Cybertronian spark chambers. Melted down, and combined with a few hundred others, it could be used to patch an injury or even construct a new spark chamber for a sparkling's upgrade.

Without ceremony, he plopped the shiny, flexible, metallic protoform into the bucket.

They would render the protoform down to its base elements, most of which were necessary for Cybertronian survival. Energon itself was fuel, but one still needed mineral supplements and metals for self repair and growth. Scraplet protoforms were rich in a number of rare elements, suspended in a complex matrix.

The final step to processing was to cut a small hole in the fuel tank. As was his right, he poured the fuel directly into his own mouth. The fuel from the first ten scraplets always went to the mech who killed them.

It wasn't much, but it slid down his throat with ease. He was hungry. He tried not to think too hard of how scraplets obtained their own food. Most of their kills were other animals, but he knew what this one had been feeding on. However, one did not live in the badlands for long if one was squeamish. A sturdy sense of practicality was a survival requirement.

He discarded the fuel tank and armor. The armor was the bulk of a scraplet's weight. The metals in the armor and tank weren't valuable enough to be worth the effort of hauling to town.

After he'd cleaned the first five scraplets, his fuel tank registered a quarter full. While he could have claimed more of the fuel for himself, he knew the rest of the tribe was running low too. He poured the remainder of the energon into cubes to take home to the clan. He estimated he would glean enough fuel from the scraplets to fill three large cubes. It would keep half a dozen symbionts or first-frame younglings, or three adult carriers, going for a day. The kids and cassettes needed it and he could hunt again tomorrow.

He never lost his hyper-alert wariness as he worked. The badlands were dangerous, and Song had survived to his age of 'frustratingly close to adulthood' by being constantly alert and aware of his surroundings.

Gravel crunched behind him.

He jerked around, blast cannon transforming smoothly into place on his arm with no conscious thought. He still had a few pellets in his rail gun and he brought that up to bear, as well. Despite his caution - and his temperamental gift for detecting the sparks of mecha - he'd been surprised by the sleek predator who now faced him.

This was no beast. His kind were built for stealth. The only reason he could see the cybercat now was that the symbiont had chosen to make himself known. Still, at this range, he should have felt something from the other mech's spark.

The cybercat was not the largest he'd seen. Clan Fiercefire, whose hunting grounds neighbored theirs, had an ancient male who massed twice what this one did. However, he was the largest felinoid that Song had ever seen without a clan badge prominently emblazoned on his shoulder. The cat sat, simply watching him, tail curled around his forepaws, alert but not menacing. He was also not, notably, emoting on a level Song could detect.

He waited for the cat to make the first move, and studied the symbiont further.

He still saw no clan badge. The cybercat had no glyphs on his armor, no faction symbols, not even a family crest. Even so, Song lowered his weapons. If the cybercat had wanted him dead he would already be fading to grey. Whatever the cybercat wanted, it wasn't the energon in Song's own tanks.

He slowly returned his blast cannon to its position under the armor of his right arm. He made no sudden moves, though the cat didn't seem to be hair trigger tense. He merely looked calm and alert.

He was not behaving in a threatening manner. Therefore, Song would not treat him as an enemy. By the oldest laws of his people, and the deepest coding he carried, he was required to protect and care for symbionts whenever they required assistance. Even feral ones.

Song reached beside him, grabbed a yet-to-be-butchered scraplet, and tossed it to the cat. "Are you hungry?"

His question sounded too loud in the wilderness silence. The cat flicked an ear back in reaction. Song hoped he understood Cybertronian. Some of the wild ones from the farthest reaches of the badlands didn't.

This symbiont's armor was pristine, however. He was puzzled by that. Feral cybercats generally had visible scars. Their autorepair systems would heal damaged armor, but not without leaving a mark. Bonded cybercats, by contrast, benefited from regular maintenance and fresh applications of paint nanites.

The cat pawed at the scraplet with one foot, then picked it up daintly in his powerful jaws. Song expected him to crunch it up and swallow - typical behavior of most bonded cats he'd seen - but the cybercat, with a disdainful flick of his head, threw the scraplet back at him. It smacked against his leg.

Song, bemused, observed, "You have excellent aim."

The cat, who'd been eying him with narrowed optics and pinned ears, suddenly grinned. He knew instinctively it was a genuine emotion, and it transformed the symbiont's appearance from enigmatic to attractive. Song, who wasn't legally an adult but who was certainly old enough to recognize a gorgeous symbiont when he saw one, reacted with a quick answering smile.

The cat finally spoke, with a comm'd message. :You should see what I can do with glitchmice.:

He startled at the comm. He knew that cybercats could speak - aloud, as well as by radio communication - but most were taciturn at best. The cat also had a broad Iacon accent, at complete odds with any dialect that Soundwave knew from various badlands tribes. His processor stuttered as he rapidly revised his assessment of the symbiont. No badlands cat had that accent. What had he stumbled upon here?

"Inquiry: Name?" He spoke in the most formal of carrier clan-dialect Cybertronian.

He glanced down at the body at his feet, suddenly worried by a terrible suspicion. The dead mech's frame was definitely broad enough to belong to a carrier.

:You first.: The cat sounded more teasing than rude. His grammar and intonation, in contrast with Soundwave's, was casual.

"Songchild, of the Clan of Singing Caves." He didn't drop his formal speech patterns out of pure habit. He didn't want to sound friendly to outsiders. He preferred to be seen as aloof and cold-sparked by non-clan mecha. It made life easier if they feared him, just a little.

His father's insistence that he earn money as a musician did not help him keep that desired reputation intact. Still, he tried to be as cool as possible without being rude.

The cat stepped closer. :Ravage.:

He gave no clan affiliation, and mentioned no bonded master. Normally, that would imply he was both feral and a rogue outcast, but that accent could also mean he was something entirely different.

At this range, he could finally feel the symbiont's spark. He relaxed a little more. Ravage felt calm, though there was a quiet intensity to his emotions that Song couldn't quite puzzle out.

"Query: Where did you come from?"

:Iacon.: Which confirmed the accent, and told him nothing he didn't already know.

"Why are you here?" He knew the Primes used carriers and felinoid teams as an honor guard, and that there were a few 'civilized' clans in the cities. However, this cat had no sigil and had not listed an affiliation when he gave his startlingly short name. Therefore, he was not military.

Ravage snorted and jerked a chin in the direction of the dead mech's skeleton of struts. The feeling of intense emotions was stronger now. He could feel anger, grief, and joy - or, at least he thought he could. Sensing emotions wasn't easy, particularly if one's modifications were neutered because one wasn't yet legally an adult. His sire refused to believe that Song could - would - use them responsibly if they were fully activated.

Ravage said, with surprisingly little venom given the content of his words, :That glitchbrained idiot at your feet was my master. He had some bright idea that we'd reconnect with our roots. I told him it was stupid and dangerous. He didn't listen. He never listened to me.:

:I'm ... sorry.: So his worst fears were correct. This symbiont was not feral, not wild, but bond-broken. That might account for the brevity of his response when asked for his name. Sometimes, even mentioning the dead was too painful. :I'm so sorry for your loss.:

:No loss.: Ravage grunted. :He didn't actually deserve to die, but I won't miss him much.:

:He was your bondmate!: Song couldn't keep the shock from his voice.

Ravage shrugged and looked Song directly in the optics. His gaze wasn't challenging so much as firm. :He also treated me like a slave and refused to listen to my advice even when I knew what the slag I was talking about. So. Kid. I prefer my meals a little less crunchy. Can you spare me a couple protoforms and a little energon? I'm running on fumes and I'd rather not have to kill my own. I'll pay you back when I get a chance. I'm not asking for charity.:

Charity? He was almost offended by the suggestion. :You are city bred. You will find that in our world, we assist each other out. I may help you today, but you may save my life tomorrow. This is how we survive in this land.:

The cat blinked his crimson optics once. :I'm not city born, kid. Far from it. But … thank you for the reminder. It's been a long time since I've been amongst those who keep to the old ways.:

He could feel a flare of embarrassment from the cat, stronger than any emotion he'd felt so far. Ravage was difficult to read, but it was clear that he'd taken Song's words as chastisement. He wasn't wrong, either. You didn't repay this kind of assistance with money, and it would be rude and unseemly even to track who owed what. Clansmechs and symbionts simply helped one another in all ways that they could. It was the only way one could survive in this blasted land.

He wondered why anyone would chose to live amongst mecha who didn't support each other. However, feeling that perhaps he'd been a bit too harsh in his rebuke, Song retrieved his wash bowl from his subspace and poured enough energon into it to give the orphaned symbiont a full tank. He considered leaving the scraplet protoforms on the ground, then dismissed that idea. This felinoid was civilized, and probably wouldn't appreciate it. He crouched beside the energon bowl and held the gelatinous metal out in his fingers, at arm's length.

The felinoid eyed him. :Try to grab me, kid, and I'll remove that arm at the elbow.:

He knew the symbiont was not actually aggressive. He could tell that much. Without fear, he said, :Query: Would you prefer to eat off the ground?:

:Point taken.: Ravage padded closer, ears a little pinned but not panicky or flighty in his moves. Song suspected the cat's threat wasn't idle. This one had more fight than flight in his spark.

With delicate care, Ravage accepted the food from his hand, and swallowed it without chewing it. At closer proximity, Song could see the faint marks of many old scars on his armor. They had been well tended, and had healed to near invisibility. However, recent times had been tougher on the cat. The very edges of his plating looked faded, as if he was beginning to suffer from malnutrition. There were also scuff marks encircling his ankles, front and back, that had not been buffed out. One hydraulic line on a back leg was crushed at the ankle, and Song found himself itching to repair it. While not a critical injury - it was a long way from his spark and there were redundant lines to the cat's paws - it had to be painful.

Ravage wasn't limping, but Song knew enough about symbiont physiology to know the cat was making an effort to conceal weakness. Symbionts alone were vulnerable, no matter how dangerous a species they were.

:You know, I am good at catching things with my teeth in mid air,: the cat pointed out, after he finished the second scraplet taken from Song's hand. :You didn't have to put yourself at danger.:

"Analysis: Ravage very hungry, and not aggressive. And, carrier law requires all domesticated symbionts be cared for."

:Huh. Who said I was domestic?:

:You were bonded.:

:It was NOT my choice, I assure you. He gave me the choice of bond or starve.: Ravage gave the skeletonized remains a disparaging look. :He wanted to be part of the honor guard, which, of course, takes me. Then, naturally, he didn't make the cut. I did have a word with the recruiter on my own. Prime didn't need a glitch like that guarding him.:

Song found he was suprised by that confession. The symbiont had integrity and honor. Few symbionts would go behind their master's back as Ravage apparently had, but given the implied situation, it had been the right thing to do.

He wondered why Ravage hadn't simply broken the bond and turned his carrier in for kidnapping, enslavement and assault. Then, belatedly, he remembered the attitude non-Carrier mecha had towards symbionts. Ravage would have faced a very uphill fight had he wanted to press charges. Even though legally he was a free and sentient mech, few Cybertronians saw symbionts as anything other than well-programmed drones or mechanimals.

"I'm sorry." Impulsively, he offered the cat another chunk of scraplet protoform. "If he forced you into bondage, what he did was wrong by the laws of Primus himself."

:I assume he's having a nice chat with the UnMaker right about now.: After consuming the scraplet protoform, Ravage turned his attention to the energon in the bowl. :He wasn't my first master. He was definitely the worst. I'd have left him, but by the time he trusted me enough to unchain me, my ship had left and I had nowhere to go. I had a job on an exploration vessel. I'm sure they'd take me back, but they won't return for several more solar cycles. In case you're wondering, my plan was to wait until they were back in port and then break the bond and sic them on my former master.:

He definitely felt the sharp stab of anger from the symbiont. Ravage's plan sounded like a solid one, as well. He said quietly, "Suggestion: Return to the clan with me."

That earned him a snort. Ravage sounded angry - though not at Song - when he responded, :And be force-bonded to somebody else who wants a trophy symbiont? Ffft. I'd be better off dead. Or I'll go feral.:

"We can help you return to Iacon, if you'd like. Nobody will force you, I swear it. They will be pleased to meet you. It's not safe out here by yourself, and the wild ones won't accept you without a fight."

:I have no funds. You are probably not aware of just how expensive a flight to Iacon would be.:

He mulled that over. "You should inherit your master's bank account. You could buy a ticket at the nearest outpost. I will go with you, if you like."

:All his funds were spent on this trip.: Ravage shrugged. :And I am not attached to returning to Iacon. I could probably find work in any industrial center as a guard."

He scratched the back of his head, considering. "Query: Can you hunt?"

Ravage seemed to give the suggestion some careful consideration. :Most likely, yes. I've had combat training. I can fight and I am not unarmed. I was actually bonded to a soldier I veru much loved, who died in combat many years before that sorry glitch got me drunk in a bar and I woke up in chains in his quarters: He jerked his chin at the dead skeleton. :I can most likely keep myself fed, though believe me, I prefer eating my meals out of a bowl or on a plate.:

"Observation: My preferred method of eating, as well. Song is a barbarian, not an animal."

Ravage grinned at that, displaying a powerful set of jaws. :And I'm no animal either, so we understand each other perfectly.:

Song nodded. :No proper carrier would think otherwise.:

:So, what's your idea?:

"Proposal: Help me hunt to earn funds for travel. Would this be acceptable?"

:And you get to keep the energon that I don't need, and the protoform mass, other than what I need for supplements? Acceptable.: Ravage eyed him for a long, silent moment. :A win-win proposal for both of us.:

"Excellent."

Bright crimson optics regarded him in silence for a moment. :How old are you, youngling?:

He frowned. "I reach my majority in a few vorns."

Ravage snorted softly. :I'm close to twenty thousand orns old, kiddo.:

He stared at the symbiont in utter shock. While there was no technical reason that symbionts couldn't live as long as any other mech, few did. Life in the badlands was tough. Their average lifespan was measured in mere decades, if that. They matured quickly, bred prolifically, and died young. Trauma - often from combat or hunting injuries - was the most common cause of death.

Finally, he found words. Dryly, he said, "Observation: City life, easy and safe."

:Yes. I wish I could have convinced my former master of that. But if you're implying I've lived a sedentary, safe life? Pfft. You'd be surprised, kid. I'm no civilian.:

"Suggestion: Return to camp. Safer there."

:And be force-bonded again, this time by some brute of a savage? No thanks, kiddo.:

"Nobody would force you!" The words were finally torn from him with shock and outrage. It was the second time Ravage had said that, and he knew it wouldn't happen. He knew it.

Ravage huffed a sigh. :You are young and idealistic. I am old, cynical, and realistic. Someday, if you don't get eaten by scraplets or my wild cousins, you'll be like me. In the meantime, treasure your innocence, kiddo. It's pleasing to hear.:

He ran a hand over his face. He was intrigued enough by the cybercat to want to see him again, even if he was offended by the slur against his clan's good name. "Very well. Would you like to hunt with me tomorrow?"

:That would be better than hunting alone.:

"Query: Location of our camp known?"

:Of course. I can smell it.:

"I will head out before sunrise tomorrow. Meet me when I am clear of camp."

Wary red eyes studied him for a long, long moment. :Betray me, and I'll eat you.:

He knew the cat was truly worried, but he responded with humor. "You would have to defeat me to eat me."

The cat snorted in amusement. The concern was gone. :See you tomorrow, kid.:

With an efficient, graceful leap, the cat bounded into the rubble of a long-destroyed town.

Song called after him, :Be careful, Ravage.:

There was no answer, but he wasn't really expecting one. Briefly, he turned his attention to the stripped bones of the feline's former master. He'd detected no grief nor guilt from Ravage. Either the other carrier had truly been a monster or Ravage was in survival mode and wasn't processing his grief yet.

He hoped it was the latter. He didn't want to think about the darkness that would lurk in the mind of a symbiont who would not mourn even a poor master.

The clan's hunting camp was atop the remains of building so ancient that sand blown on the winds had softened the sharp edges and eons of acid rain had stained and etched the walls . Song picked his way through the rubble that surrounded the tower, then climbed the time-worn staircase to the top.

So long ago that the records were lost to time, the badlands had been decimated by a violent war. Few buildings remained intact, and this structure was no exception. The windows were blown out, and the wind howled unchecked through desolate, devastated spaces within. However, the four-story building was itself structurally sound, and the only way up or down on foot was an interior staircase. This made it safe from many forms of vermin and bandits.

Killaglitch met him at the top of the stairs. His progenitor's eldest bonded servant reached up for the bucket of protoform mass and made a face when he saw the contents. "Scraplets?"

"About a hundred." Song shifted his speech to the simpler phrasing and intimate pronouns one used with family and the closest of friends. Killaglitch was, in many ways, the closest thing to a brother that he had. The knee-high bipedal symbiont had been his playmate, babysitter, tutor, and friend for his entire life.

Killaglitch snorted. "Your carrier says she's sick of scraplets."

"Hunting has been hard."

"And fuel is fuel, yah, I know. You tell her that. Oh, and Elder Swiftsword has his struts in a knot this evening. Something about a feral felinoid in the area. Big sucker, from the image captures I saw."

"He is not feral."

The tiny biped's optic ridges rose way up. "He doesn't have a clan badge. He ran when Swiftsword hailed him."

"His name is Ravage. He approached me, likely because I am too young to bond." Song reached the fuel tanks and poured his three cubes of gleaned energon into a tank. Critically, he eyed the level. They were getting low.

"If he doesn't got an allegiance, he's feral. You know the rules. He needs to come and have a chat with us and then everything'll be good. Otherwise, he's gonna get profiled as a rogue."

"His master died within the last several day cycles." Song slopped the scraplet protoforms into a vat that was already half full. One of the symbionts would would render the silicomass down tonight. "He was force bonded, and fears being forced again. He wants to return to Iacon. I said I'd help him out."

"Soooooonnng," Killaglitch protested, drawing his name out. "You don't know anything about him."

"I understand our laws. Symbionts in need will never be turned away. He has come to me for aid and I will grant it. Additionally, his assistance with hunting will give me a useful advantage for as long as he remains."

"Feh. He's gotta approach us, not just one kid."

"He approached me. I agreed. That is the correct response according to our laws. He can claim allegiance with me, and therefore, he is neither feral nor rogue."

"Your mother's freaking." Killaglitch, bonded to her, looked smug.

He gave Killaglitch a disapproving frown. "There was no requirement that you tell her."

"It's not safe! I'm not going to stand by and let you get hurt. Song, you're too slagging naive sometimes. Cybercats are dangerous. It takes a helluva strong master to control them and this one doesn't have anybody holding the end of his chain! They're not like us - not like bipeds or fliers! He could kill and suck you dry - he could kill any of us!"

"He's no empty."

"How do you know that?"

"This discussion is over. Ravage approached me for assistance and as our laws dictate, it is my responsibility to help." He was not going to argue with a symbiont, even his mother's symbiont. Killaglitch sometimes forgot his place.

His sire, unlike his progenitor, was moderately impressed. The next morning, as he headed out into the badlands, his sire hailed him. He altered his course to meet his father amidst the cover of a crumbled dwelling. Fallsky leaned against an eroding cement wall, arms folded over his chassis, and asked without preamble, "Killaglitch told me about your new buddy. He's from the city?"

"Yes, though he said he had combat training. He's old, sire. He said twenty thousand orns, and I believe him."

The ruins were far too quiet. His father was relaxed. Song was not; the silence was unnatural. There was so much one could learn by listening to the natural background noises. Not a glitchmouse stirred in the rubble, and there were no small insectoids in the air.

"Why?" Fallsky asked Song, a blunt question if one didn't know that Fallsky was always challenging his son's assumptions.

"He's large. The trend over the last few millenia has been towards smaller and more fuel efficient frames." Song explained his reasoning, even as he scanned the ruins for thermal impressions. He found nothing, but that meant little. It was a warm day.

"And you told your mother that he didn't seem to mourn his bondmate?"

"He also said he was force-bonded. He said he was waiting for a good opportunity to break the bond, so there was definitely no emotional attachment."

"Hnnh. Probably." Fallsky ran a hand over his face, slowly, then said, "So he's a well-educated, experienced symbiont, larger than average, and single."

Song folded his arms across his chest. "He stated he is not looking for a new master."

"Yes, but we could use a cybercat." Fallsky sounded thoughtful.

Song wasn't sure what to think of his sire's words. On the one hand, he was elated his father might think him old enough to bond with his first symbiont - and bonding with such a valuable cybercat would be impressive for any warrior! On the other hand, Ravage had made it abundantly clear he wasn't interested in bonding or in living the life of a barbarian. Despite his appearance, the cat had seemed distinctly civilized. He'd even complained about the scent of the camp, and Fallsky's clan kept a clean camp.

He shook his head, finally. "I am not courting him. I am merely assisting him because ..."

"... because you're old enough that your code insists that you do. I'd be disappointed if it didn't." Fallsky sounded amused. "And deep down, you are hoping he'll take a liking to you. However, I was thinking he'd be a good match for myself. See if you can convince him to come into the camp - some hot meals and some friendly maintenance may change his opinion of the barbarian life. And I've never met a cybercat who didn't like to hunt. Can't imagine he gets many chances to kill things in Iacon."

Stung, Song objected, "I found him - he approached me - you can't ... if he does decide he's interested, I like him!"

He fell silent, wondering if he'd said too much. He was well aware that they were not alone. He didn't know what Ravage would think if he knew that Song was attracted to him.

Fallsky's laugh was a low baritone, and was like acid rain in a raw wound to Song's spirit. "Kiddo, you couldn't possibly control a cybercat. You're too young and we can't waste your skills forever. Let's face it, you're better off training as a bard versus a warrior. That cat is a warrior's bondmate. We have plenty of warriors and it would be a waste for him to bond to a musician."

Song said nothing, but his expression betrayed his angry, and hurt, reaction.

"C'mon, kiddo. Silverpins' younglings are almost old enough to court. You should look at them." His father referred to his progenitor's winged symbiont's children. His tone was soothing.

"They're silly." He refused to meet his sire's keen gaze, glowering instead at a point over his sire's shoulder.

"They'll grow up."

"They'll always be silly."

His sire's mouth pressed into a thin, angry line. However, all he said was, "If you see that cat, don't forget I want you to bring him back to camp with you."

"Yes sir." Song couldn't keep the sullen note out of his voice. He was bad at hiding his emotions; always had been.

And what was he supposed to do, pick Ravage up, throw him over his shoulder, and carry him home? Ravage had not been kidding when he said he would bite.

A few moments later, after his father was out of sight and earshot, a black and silver shape ghosted out of the ruins. Ravage had been barely a stone's throw away, waiting behind a boulder.

The cat observed with a very low-power comm, :I'm surprised you tolerate being spoken to like that.:

:Query: Tolerate what?:

:You are neither stupid nor a child. He treated you as if you are both.: Ravage sat on his haunches and regarded Soundwave assessingly. :You were also aware I was watching, and he didn't know I was here. Who is the better hunter?:

:Observation: Ravage is good at stealth, but cannot hide from vermin. Silent ruins indicate large predator frightening small predators.:

:You gave him no sign I was there.:

:Query: Did you want me to?:

Ravage grinned, baring sharp teeth. :Not especially. I'm not in a courting mood, and he is. I'd rather not have to bite him to get him to keep his hands off my plating.:

:Maintenance undesired?: He asked, grinning to make sure the cat understood he was teasing.

:If you want to fix my ankle, I wouldn't say no. But I'll bite your sire if he tries to touch me.:

:Repairs, simple!: His spark thrilled at the mere idea of touching Ravage's sleek frame. To have the trust of such a beautiful, powerful symbiont - one who had good reason mistrust mecha - was flattering. :I will not request that you visit our camp. I did not expect Fallsky to be so … disrespectful.:

:Your father told you not to forget, and you agreed.: The cat's tone was questioning, and contained a little disapproval.

:Affirmative. Song's specific agreement was 'will not forget.':

He'd suspected Ravage was far smarter than the average symbiont. This was confirmed when, after a second of parsing Song's words, Ravage snorted a laugh over the comm at him. :You'd make a fine lawyer.:

:Query: Insult intended?:

His tone was completely dry, but Ravage sensed the amusement in it. The cat's eyes gleamed brightly crimson as he trotted beside Soundwave. :I've known a few lawyers I've liked.:

:You are ancient and yet you have only known a few.:

That earned him a chuckle. :I think I like you, kid. - So, what are we hunting today?:

:Alliance River Outpost has been complaining of a digger in their tunnels.:

:Lot of energon in a digger's tanks.: Ravage's stride took on a new bounce. Soundwave suspected that the idea of a good fight had Ravage excited, as well as the idea of plenty of energon.

:Killing one requires two people. We will both benefit by working together.:

:Kid,: Ravage said, after a moment, :How are we going to work my share of the money? I have a suspicion if I walk into the outpost's trading station they'd scream in terror and run. It'd be entertaining, but not conducive to opening a savings account.:

He thought Ravage was exaggerating a bit. The townfolk would certainly be wary of him, but Ravage was sentient.

"I will accompany you. The outpost is remote, but not lawless. Legally, you can open a financial account in your own name." He failed to see why there would be a problem.

The cat eyed him sideways for a long, long moment. Then he huffed, :Fine. If you will accompany me so nobody tries to kidnap me or shoot me as vermin, and we can see what happens.:

"Excellent. Sodium hypochlorite, sodium hydroxide, needed for digger hunt. We will visit the outpost, purchase supplies, and open your account this morning."

:Sounds like a grand time,: the cybercat said, no enthusiasm in his voice at all.

They'd traveled far enough from the camp that they were unlikely to be seen by anyone. Song sat down on the collapsed rubble of an ancient wall and said, aloud, "Come here and I'll fix that ankle. It's a long walk into town."

Ravage stood quietly on three legs while Song repaired the crimped hydraulic line with a few spare parts from his subspace. All carriers in his clan carried repair parts for symbionts. Symbionts were so fragile and easily injured and many lives had been saved by immediate first aid. Song was proud of his ability to make repairs.

His father wanted him to be a bard, and had paid for the necessary upgrades to his processor when Song was a newly created sparkling. Some of those upgrades - including the expensive and rare modifications for empathy and the much more common enhanced analytical circuitry - also made him a good engineer and medic. Truth be told, he wished he could study more medicine but his father was determined that he be a bard.

If they needed a physician, the settlements had them, Fallsky said. And the clan had plenty of medics and engineers. What they didn't have was a good bard.

Ravage commented on his skill, :You know what you're doing.:

"Repair, simple."

:Thank you.:

Had Ravage been one of the clan's symbionts, he would have completed the repair with a pat on the back or a stroking of metallic feathers. Ravage wasn't one of theirs, however, so he kept his touch strictly professional. He rose. "Repair, complete. Query - pain present?"

:Feels good.: Ravage surprised him by leaning briefly against his knee. Then the cat seemed to catch himself, straightened up abruptly before Song could react, and he put several strides between them. :Let's go, before one of your clan stumbles across us.:

Alliance River Outpost was a scattered collection of reinforced dwellings and small shops in the midst of a vast, devastated plain. The 'river' in question was a dry channel the majority of the time; however, when the acid rains came, it flowed furiously with toxic runoff.

An ancient, cataclysmic, blast had leveled all original surface structures and even melted the metallic surface of the planet. The long-cooled slag rippled and swirled with mixed colors of ancient alloys, and the crust crunched underfoot as he approached. This had been an industrial complex, and below the surface there were seemingly endless ancient tunnels. However, at ground level, nothing was left of that long-ago world. Only a few primitive modern structures marked the location above ground.

He approached the outpost warily, rail gun loaded even though his arm was held loosely at his side. Ravage kept close, though not underfoot. The cat's armor was flared, making him look even larger than he really was. They were, Song supposed, wary for different reasons but both had reason to be cautious when approaching settlements.

Ravage clearly feared being coerced into a new bond. He had also made it clear that he was worried about panic-stricken reactions in general as his feral cousins were notorious for living outside society's laws. Even bonded cybercats had a reputation for savage violence, and they were often paired with the toughest clan warriors.

Song, by contrast, was watching for specific people. First, he didn't especially want to meet any of his own clan with Ravage at his side. They would ask awkward questions. He was also watching for members of other carrier clans. Some clans were friendly, and some were hostile, but all would be interested in Ravage. He had agreed to help Ravage, and was therefore honor-bound to protect him from threats from other, less traditional, clans.

There were also slavers in these parts, plus a few corrupt government officials who weren't above creative interpretation of the law. Slavers paid a bounty to certain corrupt enforcers who delivered 'convicts' to them. The townfolk would do nothing if he was arrested on false pretenses. Many mecha saw symbiotic bonds as being the same as slavery, and carriers were barely tolerated by "civilized" society. So it was with his own safety in mind that he surveyed the town as he approached.

Fortunately, Alliance River had an honorable and trustworthy mech in the role of enforcer. This was the primary reason why many carrier clans preferred to trade with this outpost. He was still cautious, but not paranoid.

This day, he saw no signs of trouble. There were five businesses in town. The largest was a traveler's inn made from a converted starship that was no longer space worthy. It had a tavern in the former hold, and Song had been invited to perform there a few times. However, the inn was dark and quiet. He heard no noises from the interior as he approached. Nobody was staying in it right now, and the tavern wouldn't open until after the end of the morning mining shift. No travelers meant no slavers. That was a relief. He relaxed a little more.

The other businesses were two competing trading posts, a bank, and a weaponsmech. These were all ramshackle buildings, constructed of salvaged metal panels and hand-forged bits. Besides the businesses, there was also a small structure that was a combination jail, enforcer's station, and medical clinic. The medic was also the town's primary enforcer and magistrate.

Most actual homes were constructed underground for security from bandits, angered Carrier Clans (Song was the first to admit that his people had a collectively impressive temper) and stellar storms. Each dwelling, however, had an above-ground vestibule that marked the location and provided drive-in access for mecha with vehicle alt modes. The size of many of the vestibules was impressive. This was a mining town, and miners were always either very large or very small.

Ravage's armor was still flared.

:Required: Sale of gleanings before visit to bank.:

Ravage gave him a look that clearly said duh without the mech actually saying anything.

:Query: Ravage frightened?:

:No.: The answer was swift, firm, and somewhat grumpy.

He almost reached down to stroke Ravage's head, then stayed his hand. He wasn't sure how Ravage would take to being comforted. Well, this would be a quick visit and then they could proceed to hunt the digger.

He ignored both trading posts. They would not give him the best price for the metals and parts he carried in his subspace. Instead, he approached the enforcer's station. Ravage followed closer on his heels, nervous caution in every movement he made. He looked like he was searching for an excuse to spook. Song managed to resist the childish impulse make a sudden noise and startle Ravage into a spectacular leap of terror, but only barely.

They were crossing the broad, covered veranda in front of the enforcer's station when the front door was flung open with a tremendous bang. Ravage jumped straight up in surprise, landed in a startled crouch, and stared with enormous eyes at the mech who'd thundered through the doorway.

The mech - a large miner whose function was tunneling - stopped short, and glowered. "New pet, Song?"

"Ravage, sentient."

"Whatever. You wouldn't believe the slagging fines ..." the mech stomped on by, grumbling vociferously and pointlessly about tickets he'd received from the enforcer for public intoxication.

:Friend of yours?: Ravage asked. The cat, now recovered from his surprise, sat at Song's feet. He was ventilating a bit fast but otherwise projecting an air of cool indifference.

:Perhaps he's a friend of yours?: Song turned the question back on Ravage.

:I have far better taste in friends.: Ravage rose, bumped Song deliberately in the knee with his hip, and then padded past him into the building. Song was unable to conceal his smile as he followed Ravage.

The Primary Enforcer - also known as Medic Scour - looked up from his work desk as they entered. His eyes narrowed when he saw Ravage. Song was mildly impressed that the mech directly addressed Ravage, but he didn't like the displeased expression on Scour's face. "Hello, Song - and you, cat, you're new."

"His designation is Ravage." Song introduced him. "Ravage, this is Primary Enforcer and Medic Scour."

Ravage nodded curtly, and sat at Song's feet. Warily, he watched the medic, and said nothing either by comm or aloud.

"Does he talk?" Scour rose. "He looks like an older model - old enough to have been Altered. Years ago, the army used to experiment on symbionts to make them more tractable. Screwed some of 'em up mentally and some are a bit glitched."

"He talks." Song was well aware of those long ago experiments, and he realized that Ravage was old enough to have been alive when the were being conducted. That was yet another reason for the cat to mistrust mecha.

The old medic lumbered across the room. Song had never seen his alt mode, but suspected it was a heavy transport. He was retired military, and it was very obvious that he had lived a hard life after being decommissioned. His plating was obviously scarred, and his paint faded and scuffed. Something in his knee clicked and grated as he moved, sounding distinctly broken.

"Ravage, eh?"

"Affirmative."

The medic scanned Ravage without asking for permission, then his eyes flickered as he accessed a database. He grunted when he found what he was seeking and to Ravage he said, "You've been around the block a few times, buddy."

Ravage yawned pointedly.

The medic snorted and said like it was a curse, "Cybercats. He talk to you much, Song?"

"Yes sir."

The medic folded his arms across his chest. "You courtin' the kid, Ravage?"

From Ravage, there was only silence.

"Query: Ravage experiencing ... issues?" Song wasn't sure what to make of his new friend's reaction.

"Ah, don't worry about it, Song. Let me tell you a bit about the cat you've got there since he probably won't brag. Not this one, anyway. He's heavily modified for military work, with a strongly reinforced frame and likely an upgraded processor and operating system. He has not been modified for tractability, however, as he was bonded to a special ops soldier. Isn't that right, Ravage?" Ravage remained silent; Scour seemed unbothered by this. "I'm willing to bet he's got a pretty low opinion of soldiers, warriors, and politics. He's lived through some nastiness, that's for sure. He thinks I am just one more medic, and I bet he's had his fill of medics."

:Medics are okay. Enforcers lick rust.:

Song blinked at Ravage's comment. "He has no problem with medics, but Ravage states enforcers lick rust," he relayed, amused.

Scour threw his helm back and laughed, rich and deep. Ravage's glower did not improve. Scour, still chuckling, returned to his desk and pulled out a datapad. "Ravage, buddy, I think we're going to be good friends."

The cybercat's tail tip twitched; otherwise, he gave no response.

"So, Song, what do you have to sell to me today?" Scour asked, finally returning to business.

Song pulled several buckets and boxes out of his subspace, answering Scour's question with the merchandise in question. Scour, well used to carrier-clan ways, wasn't surprised by Song's lack of verbosity.

Scour picked through the gleaned elements and parts. As Song was aware from many past dealings, Scour was primarily interested in micronutrients and Cybertronium. The Wastelands were a harsh environment and the energon mined here lacked many vital minerals. Song had a small chunk of elemental sulfur in a tightly sealed jar, plus a glossy hunk of magnesium and a silvery ball of Cybertronium the size of both his fists.

"Where'd you get that?" Scour was impressed by the Cybertronium.

Song shrugged. The truth was that he'd found it in a collapsed building in one of the endless destroyed cities of the Wastelands, but he wasn't going to tell Scour that. For one, someone else might have a claim on the building, and for two, he hadn't gleaned everything he could from the ancient and long-abandoned lab.

"Hnnh. I'll take the gold, too, and - how fresh is that protomass?" He sniffed the bucket of scraplet carcasess from yesterday.

"I killed them yesterday evening."

"Fresh enough, then. I can use the whole bucket."

Song knew the worth of his merchandise and named a fair price. The medic haggled only half-heartedly before they settled. After transferring the credits to Song's account at the bank, Scour fished a scraplet protoform out of the bucket and said, "Here, Ravage. What some snackums? Num-num."

Ravage gave him a look.

"Guess not."

:If he ever baby talks to me again, the snackum I will eat will be his spark chamber.: Ravage turned on his heel and marched out of the building.

"Observation: Ravage is not a child."

"I know. Did you see the look on his face?" Scour's snickers followed Song as he exited the building.

The bank had one teller and that mech was primarily resident for security reasons. There were quite a few types of crime associated with financial accounts, including forced withdrawals at gunpoint and various kinds of hacking.

The mech's name was Thudfoot, and he was clearly a retired miner. He grunted as Song entered, then said sharply, "New pet, kid?"

"Designation: Ravage. Awareness: Sentient. Requires: Financial account setup."

Thudfoot rose from his position on a stool behind the counter. The bucket of some sort of excavation machine framed his head like a cowl, casting his face into shadow. From deep within, red optics - the sign of a mech with vision adapted to the infrared spectrum - glowed like demonic embers. While not enormous, he was several feet taller than Song, and far broader. He moved with the slow gravitas of a mech with tremendous mass. When he planted both palms on the counter and stared down at them, he loomed.

"His carrier needs t' open the account."

Song did not back down. He forced himself to stand his ground and show no fear. Thudfoot was a bully, but Song was not a small mech, and he was far faster and far more agile. His rail gun was also far better suited for close-proximity fighting versus the missile launchers clamped to each of Thudfoot's shoulders. "Ravage is single."

"Then 'e's feral 'an 'e don't get no account here. He wants t' do business 'ere, tell 'im to find a master t' sign for 'im."

"Ravage: Equal to any sentient Cybertronian. This is law."

"'E's a primitive. You know that. You people tame and bind cybercats all the time!" Thudfoot leaned farther over the counter. "You're a minor. You can't open one for him - ain't legal for you to bond with him. So I guess you're stuck."

Dismayed, and a little surprised, Song looked down at Ravage. He really didn't know what to do. He'd expected skepticism, and perhaps some teasing, but a blanket refusal to allow Ravage to open an account? It was wrong. And he had no idea how to counter this.

Ravage huffed a sigh and jumped up onto the counter with one smooth motion. Thudfoot jerked back as Ravage invaded his space. Soundwave tensed, willing to fight if Thudfoot assaulted his new friend. The cat, however, did not attack. He simply sat down on the counter and said in an utterly calm voice, "I am neither tame nor bound."

His voice was free of the raspy consonants and harsh articulation that Song associated with most cybercats. It was a smooth baritone, exactly matching the voice Ravage used for radio communications, and there was neither threat nor anger in it. If Song had closed his eyes he could have pictured that voice emanating from some wealthy and cultured noble.

Thudfoot stammered, "G-Get off my c-counter!"

"Why?"

Song barely managed to keep a straight face. Ravage's tone was now too innocent.

"Because I'll blast yer aft inta the Pit if ya don't!"

Song rested a hand on Ravage's back. Despite Ravage's purposeful calm, tension hummed through his struts. It was the first time he'd touched the cat other than to repair his ankle; he hoped Ravage wouldn't take the gesture the wrong way. "Observation: Ravage is Song's friend. Do you require the approval of my creators to conduct this transaction?"

Thudfoot ... blinked. Cautiously, he said, "That's how it is, huh?"

Song was the offspring of two of the most powerful carriers in the region. He seldom pointed that fact out, but Thudfoot had just remembered it. Song suspected his sire, at least, would be less than approving of his actions here, but if his sire found out, he could face that music later.

"Ravage has legal rights."

Thudfoot growled a curse in an alien language, and made a shooing gesture at Ravage. "Off my counter."

The cybercat hopped down, landing lightly at Song's feet. Even as he was turning around, the flat expanse of the bank's counter split apart and reconfigured into a terminal with a view screen and connection ports. The view screen was for Thudfoot's benefit; he was hired largely to ensure that nobody hacked a financial institute's records or conducted other forms of malfeasance.

"Be mah guest." Thudfoot gestured at the terminal.

:If he treats all his guests the way he's treating us, I'm willing to bet he's lonely,: Ravage's voice was full of snark, even though his body language was perfectly neutral. He rose up on his hind legs, and a connection cable emerged from the 'wrist' of his foreleg.

Thudfoot walked around to observe. His optic ridges rose in surprise as Ravage skillfully negotiated the menus and opened an account. The cat looked supremely satisfied as he signed off.

Song said, "Thank you."

Thudfoot said with clear surprise, "The cat didn't need help at all."

:He'd probably burst a gasket if he knew what I did when I was in the military.: Without a word aloud, Ravage turned and walked out. Song hurried to follow.

Asking about another's past was not considered polite in carrier culture, but Ravage had brought the subject up. As they headed out of town, Song asked, "Query: What was your military role?"

Ravage glanced up at him. :I specialized in on-location hacking of secure enemy systems, often alien ones.:

He'd suspected Ravage was unusually intelligent. He had not expected to find out that he was, likely, brilliant.

:Query: Why did you leave the military?:

:I had a master who I loved very much. He was murdered. I ... did not wish to remain a soldier after that.:

:Murdered?:

Ravage was quiet for so long that he thought he'd offended the cat into silence. However, when Ravage did speak, he didn't sound upset at Song. :His death was not in the line of duty. That, I could have accepted.:

:I'm sorry.:

:So am I. He was a good mech, and it was so needless that he die. I ... had one sibling, another cybercat. My sibling had made a friend - a lover - and you are doubtless aware of the opinion many normal Cybertronians have of Carrier-Symbiont bonds. The fool thought he was freeing us by murdering our carrier. My sibling offlined from grief.:

:I'm ... sorry.:

Ravage jumped a puddle of random and unidentifiable liquid in the road. :After I killed the fragger, I spent the next several hundred vorns in detention, convicted of murder myself.:

Song snorted. "Observation: Justifiable homicide."

:Unfortunately, 'he needed killing' is not a valid legal defense.:

"I'm sorry."

:It happened a long time ago. - So, kid, what's your story, anyway?:

He wasn't sure how to answer that. "Please clarify question."

:So formal. I'm guessing you were raised traditionally.:

"Affirmative." Agreeing seemed the simplest answer.

:Yet you're known well enough in town.:

"Song, frequent visitor. Role in clan, earn credits to purchase items we cannot make ourselves."

:So you kill vermin and sell the parts?:

"I enjoy hunting. However, I am skilled with a laserharp and have substantial musical training and the requisite frame modifications to be a skilled musician."

:Your name is Song. Do you sing as well?:

"Creators, optimistic." He flashed Ravage a smile. "I am not famed for my singing voice."

With training from a variety of hired mechs, he'd learned to play the laserharp with great technical skill. The complex mechanism and the attention to detail required to make music with it appealed to his love of math and order. However, nobody even tried to pretend he had a future as a singer except his sire. Oh, he could certainly carry a tune, and match pitch and rhythm; he was technically skilled. His vocalizer was highly upgraded. However, he didn't like to sing. He preferred not to draw attention to himself and he definitely didn't like projecting his emotions into his words. It felt wrong to expose his innermost feelings to others in such an intimate way.

Ravage flashed him a grin. :Your creators selected an occupation for you without your input?:

:Affirmative.:

:That sounds like the start of many entertaining holofic tragedies, but it must suck slag to live such a plot.:

He laughed aloud. "You can't even imagine."

He discovered, as they progressed through the blasted lands towards the tunnels that had been taken over by the digger, that Ravage was surprisingly easy to talk to. There was a friendly give-and-take between them. Song had a tendency to speak slowly and in few words; he was regularly annoyed when others either impatiently finished his sentences for him or elaborated pointlessly on what he had just stated.

Ravage was a bit more verbose than he was, but he stopped to listen to Song speak. Song, in turn, found he was more willing to talk to the cybercat than he was to most mechs.

:So what's the plan?: Ravage asked as they reached a slag heap that marked the digger's primary tunnel.

:We gas it to drive it out. I'll set explosives at the entrance. The only weak spot on a digger is his ventral orifice. Your job is to hit the button and blast his aft end. Then we keep him above ground until he dies of energon loss.:

:Sounds simple enough.:

:Watch my back while I set the charges.: He crouched amid the loose talus of the tailings pile, and armed several remote-controle mines. :Reminder - Ventral orifice.:

:Yes, boss, I can remember to blast the big nasty in his afthole.:

Song gave the cybercat a look. Unrepentant, Ravage grinned at him. He shook his head and set the detonator up behind the cover of some boulders. :Reminder - Do not blow me up. Soundwave, exit first.:

:Reminder - Special ops cybercat.:

:Reminder - And don't forget it.:

This got him a smirk from Ravage. :Never do, kid.:

With that, he cautiously slipped down into the tunnel with two jugs of chemicals and a bucket in his hands. The digger would be asleep right now, and he moved with silence that was augmented by sound dampening mods originally meant to silence the noise of his internal systems when performed music. Carefully, carefully, he crept far into the tunnels.

Only when he could hear the faint respirations of the giant beast did he stop. Moving with swift silence, he poured the chemicals into the bucket. A noxious green cloud boiled up.

No longer worried about remaining undetected, he chucked a large rock down the tunnel then ran for all he was worth. The digger awoke with a roar that turned instantly to choking, sputtering and screaming outrage. With several tons of enraged vermin on his heels he bolted back out into the sunlight.

With absolutely perfect timing, Ravage hit the detonator. The digger was blasted skywards. He kept running, even as bits and pieces of digger innards came crashing down around him. The main body hit a second later with a metallic crunch and a splash of internal fluids, hot and scalding. Steaming energon sprayed across the landscape, soaking his feet.

:Song, fall back!: Ravage's command was sharp, and Song instantly, reflexively, obeyed.

The digger was mortally wounded, but they were notoriously slow to die. It lunged at Song and he dodged, luring it farther from its burrow. Ravage, meanwhile, was moving at lightning speed from his left. He barely had time to register that the cat had launched himself into the air in front of the jaws of the beast. Ravage executed a neat spin in midair, and launched a rocket down the digger's gullet. There was a muffled whoomph. The thing stopped moving with intent and began thrashing with death throes.

:You never told me you were armed!:

:You never asked.: The cat sounded remarkably smug. Ravage landed and spun about, vents flared, respirations rapid as he cooled his core. :And legally, I'm not supposed to be armed with military grade munitions.:

:Anything else I should know?:

:I like my ears scratched?: Ravage grinned toothily at him. :Seriously. I have the mounts and when my dear, beloved former master announced he was going to find his roots, I looked up some old contacts of mine. I'm not stupid and I had hoped to keep both our afts intact. I've got three more missiles and a pair of laser rifles under my armor. Military grade.:

:Ravage keeps many secrets.: He didn't disapprove.

:Song, trusts Ravage's intentions.: Ravage's expression turned serious. He walked a few feet away from the twitching, dying, digger and sat on his haunches. :Most mechs would not.:

Uncomfortably, he shifted from one foot to the other.

:You are untrained, but you possess neural mods, correct?:

Aloud he hissed, "No one is to know that!"

:You read the emotions of others.:

:Not consciously. The engineer who modified my neural circuits as a sparkling would not enable the hardware until I was grown and asked for it.:

:Why?:

:My parents thought it would make me a better bard.: He couldn't keep the growl of annoyance out of his voice. :Feeling the anger, and fear, and the knowing the death throes of an enemy will not make me a better warrior. I do not wish to become a bard.:

:So you have some level of subconscious input.:

:Slight. Yes.: He frowned at Ravage. :It's not conscious input.:

:I thought as much, when you never showed fear of me. Almost all would.:

:You never behaved in a threatening manner. I can't sense you unless you're almost within touching distance.: He paused, then added, :I have enjoyed your company. What I sense from you matches your words. I like your honesty.:

Ravage was silent for a long moment, watching him with narrowed crimson optics. :Does that offer to visit your camp still stand?:

:Of course.: He blinked. :Though the elder mechs will hassle you.:

:I can handle the elders.: Ravage smirked.

Soundwave had no doubt he could.

Ravage sauntered at his heels, tail waving in the air, and stride loose and relaxed. Song tried to affect the same nonchalance and knew he was failing. Partly, he was nervous about the reaction of the clan. He also had a giddy feeling of pride and joy at making friends with such a potent, powerful symbiont. He was too young to bond, of course, and Ravage would certainly want an older and stronger mech, but he knew they were cutting quite the figure as they crossed the camp.

From Song's standpoint, standing out in a crowd wasn't necessarily a good thing. Despite the fact that both his carriers were alpha coded, Song was a firm beta. At a spark deep level, Song hated being singled out. He was not meant to be a leader.

The overall effect, when everyone stopped to stare at him, was very close to stage fright.

Killaglitch, predictably, was the first to actually approach them. His progenitor's youngest symbiont approached at almost a run, demanding, "Song, are you crazy? That's a feral cybercat and you just - it just - into camp - frag!"

:Can I eat him?: Ravage asked on an open frequency, strong enough for everyone in camp to hear. This caused a number of alarmed looks, plus a few snickers.

Aloud, Song said, "No. Unfortunately, Killaglitch has useful skills."

"Besides, he'd probably taste bad." Killaglitch's sire said, stepping beside his son and cuffing him upside the head. "You must be Ravage. There have been rumors about you. I believe you've been invited to visit us, correct?"

Ravage inclined his head in acknowledgement.

"I'm Searchlight, and this is my son Killaglitch, and ..." Searcher went on to introduce most of the clan. They numbered close to seventy. There were fourteen adult carriers, two sparkling carriers in their first frames, plus Song (who would be an adult so achingly soon). The remaining numbers were a mixed lot of bipedal and winged symbionts of varying ages.

"You're huge!" Killaglitch observed, inching closer. His fear was slowly being replaced by curiosity. "You must weight three times what I do!"

Ravage cast him a sideways look, then huffed a sigh and held up a paw, sole facing the young symbiont. It took Killaglitch a long moment to realize that Ravage was offering to compare paw-to-hand size.

"Wow!" Killaglitch exclaimed, after tentatively pressing his fingers to Ravage's paw. "I'd sure like to be on your side in a fight!"

Song stroked Ravage's head without even thinking about it. He was pleased that Ravage was making an effort to be social. He didn't think his new friend was any more fond of being the center of attention than Song himself was.

Ravage didn't object to the touch; indeed, an almost imperceptible amount of tension left his frame and he leaned into the comforting caress. Song stated firmly, "Ravage: Excellent hunter. Dislikes combat. Understands difference."

"What, you're saying the cat's a damn pacifist?" This came from Golderlight, Song's elder cousin. "That's pretty useless."

Ravage narrowed red optics at Golderlight. He was unamused by the comment from the tall carrier, and his expression showed it. He clearly preferred to be silent around strangers, but he was also more than capable of making his point known. Song caught a quick databurst from Ravage to Golderlight. Golder went quiet, optics suddenly a little paler.

:Query: What did you send him?:

:My military record, my civilian resume, and my criminal rap sheet.: Ravage pressed his head against Song's thigh. :It's amazing the records you accumulate when you're my age.:

"Comment: Withdrawn." Golderlight, voice formal and posture suddenly wary, backed up a bit.

"Query: Not interested in courting Ravage?" Song responded just as formally, but with a teasing tone to his voice.

Golderlight's response was a quick glance at the cat. "He seems fonder of you, Song."

Fallsky, late arriving to the mob of mechs, said firmly from the back, "Song: Too young. Ravage: Welcome. Will you sit and speak with me?"

Ravage rose, causing a few of the symbionts and Golderlight to recoil, and a few others to go oooh. Ravage was, Song thought, incredibly impressive amidst a crowd of smaller symbionts. Politely, he said, :Ravage: Conference requested with Elder Fallsky and Youngling Song.:

Golderlight sent a quick databurst to their father, likely the same rap sheet and resumes that Ravage had sent him. Fallsky hesitated suddenly, optics narrowing.

:Would you deny clan law?: Ravage demanded, a bit sharply.

Fallsky waited too long to be polite before responding. Clearly, he was discussing Ravage over his quantum bonds with his mate and possibly the eldest of his symbionts. "Ravage: Welcome," he finally said, gruffly. He added, "Song, go into town with Killaglitch. We need new some new power cells."

Ravage tilted his head and regarded Fallsky for a long moment. :Ravage - Will accompany Song. His presence is pleasurable.:

With no pretense of formality, or hint of polite tones, Fallsky growled, "The boy is too young for the likes of you! He's not a slagging warrior and I'll not have him bound to a symbiont with your history. You will desist in your interest in him or you will leave our territory before nightfall. Is that clear?"

Ravage glanced up at Song. In his clear, Iacon-accented voice, he said aloud, "Song: Old enough to make decisions about his own future. He is notably intelligent and well mannered. It his his choice, and mine. Not yours."

"BEGONE!" Fallsky rumbled.

Ravage met his gaze calmly. "Or perhaps you fancied me for yourself? If you cannot have me, you find it humiliating your child will? A parent should be proud of his child, not jealous."

Fallsky, always volatile, leveled the blaster mounted on his wrist. Song knew that he was going to fire; he could read his sire's expression and knew this wasn't an idle threat to make Ravage leave. Fury raced through his circuits. How had this gone so bad, so quickly?

Impulsively, instinctively, he knocked Ravage aside with his leg. Searing plasma scorched his plating. For a moment, all he could feel was the sensation of exploding exploding fuel lines, bursting oil reservoirs, melting sensors, and a cascade of errors across his HUD.

The pain hit a moment later and he screamed.

Wound through his howl of shocked agony was Ravage's battle cry of rage.

That sense of empathy that Ravage had guessed he possessed woke in that instant to warn him of Ravage's ferocious, blinding fury. One of Ravage's friends - and a potential partner - had been injured by his own sire. Ravage's anger was fueled by a sense of potent justice, and not tempered by the staying hand of a master.

Now he understood why cybercats were so feared. There was nothing to stop Ravage, no force in the universe that could call him back, save the hand of a firm and respected master.

Terror for his sire propelled him back to his feet. Ravage had his sire down, and the two were grappling on the ground. Ravage was going for the kill; he was kicking with his hind feet and biting Fallsky's arms with his jaws. Energon covered both of them. Several mechs were trying to get a clear line of fire on Ravage but he and Fallsky were thrashing too much.

He didn't know where the strength of voice, or the projection of his stubborn will came from. He only knew he shouted aloud, with all the command he'd never had before in his life, "RAVAGE, ENOUGH!"

Ravage hesitated. Song did not. He lunged forward, ignoring the pain and dysfunction in his damaged leg, to grab the cybercat by the neck. He ripped Ravage free and flung him several feet back. "DESIST!"

Ravage, respirations rapid, and with Fallsky's energon coating his face and claws, regarded Song for a long, long, moment. For a moment, Song feared that Ravage would ignore his order. He tensed himself for the fight of his life.

The cat surveyed Song's leg, then turned his attention to Fallksy. Song's sire's arm was ripped to shreds, and he had a host of more minor injuries. Aloud, in that dry Iaconian accent, Ravage said, "I desist. The damage appears equal. Song does not wish me to continue. I have chosen to follow his orders."

:Thank you,: he commed, a bit shakily, to Ravage. :He's an idiot, but he's my sire. I'm sorry Ravage. I can't believe this happened. He was going to shoot you!:

The cat said aloud, for all to hear, "You do realize this means I'm keeping you."

:What?: He stared in stunned disbelief as Ravage turned smoothly on his haunches and exited the camp, leaving energon-stained foot prints in his path. :Wait! Do you need medical attention?:

:I am not injured.:

With that, Ravage was gone, disappearing behind a jumbled pile of rubble. A resounding reverberation of metal on metal road told them he'd leaped off the edge of the rooftop camp.

Chaos erupted. It registered in Song that he was being blamed for bringing the cybercat into the camp; that the symbionts were terrified they could have been killed; that his own sire was screaming at him for inviting a dangerous beast into their midst. The latter accusation jarred him back to reality. Years of anger crystalized into one shattering realization. His father was angry that he had brought Ravage to the camp, was publicly blaming him for this debacle, but it had been his father who had requested he invite Ravage to the camp in the first place!

He was done. He didn't want to spend one more moment than necessary dealing with the impossible mech who was his sire.

Song said in the most formal tone of voice he could muster, "Song: Leaving."

There would have been no fight if Fallsky had been reasonable and had treated both Ravage and Song with respect. His father was an idiot and something deep within Song's spark was done with following him. Song was a beta, sparked to follow others, but it was time he found someone other than his sire to call leader.

"Wait, what?" Fallsky demanded.

"Leaving."

"You can't. You're too young!"

"Song: Old enough." He wasn't quite legally an adult, but there weren't many enforcers who'd force him home against his will. He was reasonably sure he could find work - as a musician, if nothing else - and if that failed, he was capable of living off the land. However, if Ravage chose to accompany him, perhaps could do better than mere subsistence. The cat had some very valuable skills and a razor sharp intellect.

Primus, he wanted Ravage. He wanted Ravage as his friend, and newly awakening code deep in his processor insisted Ravage could be far more than that.

"You idiot!" His sire shouted at him.

"Song observes: Personal educational studies indicated very high intelligence and analytical skills. Scholarships offered by higher institutes of learning in the past. Sire refused to accept. Opportunity lost of benefit to both Song and entire clan. Stated desire, military career. Skills and spark well suited. Musical talent: Acceptable but not brilliant."

Fallsky spluttered.

"Ravage offers opportunity ..."

"You're too young! You can't control him!"

He dropped the formality in place of an insultingly short-worded, terse statement. "I just did."

There was chaos as he packed what few belongings were truly his. His progenitor sobbed, his sire shouted; his cousins argued. Their mixed, interrelated, and highly varied pack of symbionts added chaos to the drama. Side fights broke out as mechs argued both sides of his decision.

Ravage's dossier made the rounds.

Killaglitch finally beamed it to him. He was unsurprised to find that Ravage had four previous masters. He'd broken a bond with the first one my mutual agreement. Both had been very young, and after a few tens of vorns together, she had sparkbonded with a mate and settled down to have children. Ravage had not desired a domestic life - few cybercats did - and he had found a new master who owned his own starship. Unfortunately, his second master had died in a bar fight shortly after bonding. It then took Ravage almost a thousand vorns to bond again and he'd amassed quite a criminal record in the interim: theft, assault, banditry. Reading between the lines, and remembering what he knew of history, he suspected that Ravage had been struggling to survive and probably working with organized criminals.

Once he had acquired a criminal record, Ravage's desirability as a symbiont would have gone down dramatically. While he certainly could have found a new master, Ravage would not have settled for just anyone. Song thought that Ravage would rather be alone than suffer another broken bond.

Song was actually unsurprised that Ravage had eventually bonded with a cityborn carrier who was an enforcer, and who had eventually joined the military. The notes in the file indicated that the carrier had met Ravage when he'd arrested the symbiont (a task that had not been easy!), and that the carrier had taken a personal interest in Ravage's welfare while he served his sentence. They had become friends, and that friendship had eventually had turned into a bond.

Ravage's skills as a hacker, burglar, and thief had turned out to be quite useful to the military. He and his master, along with a second cybercat, had become skilled scouts, spies, and saboteurs. They had a long and storied career, with many accolades, awards, medals, and significant promotions. Some of the medals tied to Ravage's military career indicated deeds of great bravery and fierce honor.

Unfortunately, as he'd indicated, his third master had been murdered. He had killed his bonded master's murderer, and had done hundreds of vorns of time working in the mines as punishment. Few mechs would have lived that long in such a harsh environment, much less a small symbiont! His prison record indicated he'd had time added on for fighting, and it named a few associates. Soundwave's optic ridges rose when he recognized the name of one of those associates as a tough ex-miner turned first gladiator and then politician, who was currently shaking the status quo up in Iacon. Perhaps Ravage's friendship with Megatronus was how he had survived.

After release from the mines, he'd picked up a few fines for public vagrancy, did time in a local jail for theft of energon, and accumulated a debt to a public medical clinic for a repair of a damaged hip joint. When he was unable to pay that debt he had ended up imprisoned again. He had then indentured himself to a noblemech as a body guard, and the noblemech - an associate of Megatronus - had paid his debts off and freed him.

Ravage, after earning his freedom, had worked respectable jobs for the next thousand vorns. He'd primarily worked for a security firm, infiltrating factories as a 'corrupt' guard to identify rings of thieves. Eventually, he had shifted careers and put his military-trained analytical skills and off world experience to good use for the Iaconian library, decrypting and translating alien texts.

He had been fined for biting a scientist named Shockwave; the fine was surprisingly small and had been paid by Megatronus.

After that, he had signed on with an exploration team run by the Iaconian science institute. He'd worked with a group of pretenders, inserting themselves into alien cultures without detection. His specialty, predictably, was infiltration of alien computer networks.

The record indicated another change of career just a few hundred vorns ago. He'd been bonded (force-bonded, Song knew) to a complete idiot of a carrier. Despite Ravage's formidable skills and experience, they had been turned down when his carrier had applied for the Cybertronian honor guard. No surprise there, Song thought. Ravage was clearly talented, but he had a sketchy history. It was unlikely Ravage could have obtained the clearance to work in the presence of Primes and high ranking politicians. Plus, given Ravage's clear dislike for his master, and his own words on the matter, he would almost certainly have told the examiners that he'd been force-bonded. That, alone, would have eliminated the carrier as a candidate for the Prime's honor guard.

Song knew that Ravage could have broken that bond, given time and a good opportunity to escape, but the exploration vessel had left without him. Had he broken the bond and fled, he would have been alone, and without support. The political dissident Megatronus, who was apparently his friend, was currently imprisoned for inciting riots. The same went for most of Megatronus's allies.

Given Ravage's past history of struggles when unemployed, and the fact that he'd alluded to his former master controlling his finances, Song suspected he would have been highly reluctant to break the bond for purely economic reasons. Ravage was nobody's fool, and if his choice was to revert to a life of crime to survive, or endure the presence of an unwanted master, he would take the latter choice. Once Ravage's ship had returned, Song had no doubt that he would have broken the bond and left on it.

Idly, Song wondered if he could find work on that ship. He didn't know much about space travel ... but perhaps they could use a musician? And he could certainly assist Ravage with his tasks.

There was more in the files that didn't surprise him. The camp was collectively shocked, but Song was not surprised to find that Ravage had multiple degrees in a diversity of fields. It wasn't unusual for an older Cybertronian to have many degrees and careers over the course of a long life, but symbionts generally didn't live long enough nor have the intellectual inclination to be scholars.

Ravage had degrees in engineering, communications, tactical analysis, an advanced degree in xenotech engineering - the slagger was even a pilot - and his files included a notations about long-ago court victories. It seemed it hadn't been an easy road for him to get an education. He'd fought for it, however, and he'd earned it.

The communications degree explained Ravage's accurate guess about Song's mods, he supposed.

Song mulled over what he learned as he packed. Ravage clearly had the capacity for ruthless violence, and he wasn't above theft if it meant his survival. However, he didn't seem like he was a criminal by preference. Rather, if he had to steal or fight to survive, he would. Song couldn't fault him for that.

The most important thing he noted from his analysis of Ravage's history was that the cat just didn't give up. He'd fought for an education. He'd survived the loss of four bonds - one bond broken because his master's choices didn't agree with his own desires, and three by death (and one of those deaths had to have been truly traumatic). He had survived a horrific amount of time in the mines, and when released, he'd left with allies.

He liked that about the cat. Ravage wasn't a quitter, but he also wasn't a loose cannon. He was tough, stubborn, and opinionated, yet he also made friends with others. That some of those friends weren't even carriers or symbionts impressed Song even more.

Song finished packing his belongings into his subspace and a small rucksack at the same time he completed reviewing Ravage's history. There was one final note indicating that Ravage had recently been given an offer to rejoin the military ... minus his carrier. Apparently, the recruiter for the Prime's honor guard had been impressed enough by Ravage to suggest that he break his bond with his carrier and join the honor guard on his own. The recruiter had noted that there were multiple carriers who were already guards for the Prime, who had expressed interest in courting Ravage.

Ravage had not answered the recruiter's offer before leaving for the badlands.

Killaglitch said, very quietly, "He's scary, Song."

Song paused to crouch and face the young symbiont who had been like a brother to him. "It'll be okay, Glitchy. He doesn't scare me."

"Don't call me that."

He pulled Killaglitch into a brief hug. He couldn't think of any words to say, but he would miss him.

"I'll send you messages," Killaglitch promised.

"Of course." He stood up. Formally, to his sire, he said, "Fallsky, Sir: Right of return requested."

"Denied." Fallsky snapped.

The band murmured, more than a bit of disapproval in their words.

He bit back an angry response, and replied, "Request: Right of Clan Share."

By tradition, any carrier of the clan who was formally outcast would receive an equal percentage of the clan's wealth. Since they all worked together, most property was communal, excluding small personal items. By his estimation the clan's bank accounts held several hundred thousand credits - not to mention the wealth in trade goods they had stashed in many locations.

"You're too young." Fallsky ground out. "You're not an adult."

The murmurs were louder. He might not be an adult, but he'd been earning credits for the clan since he was barely more than a sparkling, both as a musician and as a hunter. Counting himself as an adult, there were fifteen adult members. He'd earned far more than one-fifteenth of the money in their accounts, even subtracting the amount spent on him as a sparkling for his exceptional and expensive upgrades.

Killaglitch huffed. "Fallsky, you can't outcast him if he's a minor. If he leaves while he is underage, he automatically has right of return. If you're going to declare him an adult, you've got to give him his clan share. Pick one."

He gave the symbiont who was his almost-brother a surprised look.

Killaglitch shrugged and mouthed, "Your mom," when Fallsky wasn't looking in his direction. Apparently, his other parental unit wasn't willing to directly cross her bondmate but Killaglitch, as someone else's symbiont, couldn't directly be punished by Fallsky.

Fallsky growled angrily. Moments later, Song's financial account pinged him with notification of a substantial transfer of credits. "Song: Old enough."

Killaglitch whimpered softly. Others murmured disapproval. Song debated transferring the credits right back and insisting he was a minor, and by clan law he couldn't claim his clan share and should have an automatic right of return if he left the clan. However, this had been a long time coming.

His sire had never accepted who he was. His sire never would.

It was time to go.

"Contact: Always welcome," he told the rest of his clan. He paused, then added, "Affection: Not lost. Invitation for messages: Extended openly to all of my kin and clan."

Fallsky growled under his breath.

Limping, Song turned away.

Killaglitch called after him, "Until later!"

Fallsky growled a firm, "Goodbye!"

The distinction wasn't lost on him.

He didn't look back. He would return someday, he vowed. Fallsky wouldn't be leader forever. Others would welcome his return. And when he came back, if only as a visitor, it would be with accomplishments and deeds to tell about that would bring honor to the entire clan.

Ravage rejoined him halfway into town. The cat had simply slipped out of the shadow of a building and fallen into step beside him without a word. Ravage's presence, trotting beside his knee, felt right in ways that Song couldn't define.

Much later, after he'd made it into town and presented himself at the enforcer's office for repairs, Scour grunted. "You know, your sire's an idiot."

"Observation: This, known." Song sat in a chair in the medic-slash-enforcer's office, foot propped up on a box. The medic was seated cross-legged on the floor beside him, scowling at the damage as he repaired it. Ravage had gone to get fuel, as Song had lost considerable energon.

"If you were my youngling, I'd be damned proud of you." Scour probed at heat-damaged hydraulic lines in Song's leg. "This damage isn't too bad. I'll clean most of the big crap up and your auto-repair should fix the microcircuits by morning."

He wasn't sure what to say. Suddenly, he felt lost and alone. He didn't know what to do, or where to go. He was lost.

"Ravage says he chose me." Song hunched his shoulders a bit. "I'm too young. I don't know what to do."

"You think you can spend the rest of your life with that old glitch as your partner?" Scour glanced up at him, then returned to cutting out burst lines.

Song answered instantly, "Affirmative."

"You're not legally an adult, and won't be for what, another vorn and a half? But unless I misunderstood my cultural briefing on carrier clans, you need to get out of your sire's territory before he decides to make you leave, right?"

"Affirmative." He sighed, knowing his dismay showed inappropriately on his face. "Problems: Not legal for a youngling to sign work contracts, rent housing, purchase transportation tickets."

A ticking of claws on metal flooring made him look up sharply. Ravage, now clean of Fallsky's energon, entered the clinic. The cat easily jumped up onto Scour's desk and regarded both of them thoughtfully for a long moment before producing two cubes of energon from his subspace. He didn't say anything aloud, however. Song gratefully took the first cube and downed it in several quick swallows.

The medic addressed Ravage, "You know, Song could use a visor and face mask to hide his age."

:And his emotions. His expressions are wonderful to behold, but are a weakness for a warrior.: Ravage looked Song directly in the eyes. :I have made contact with some of my allies. You will not be a child when we reach Iacon.:

"Iacon?"

"Unless you have another destination in mind, that's a good 'un." Scour patted Song's shoulder encouragingly. "It's a big city, and you can get a real education there. You could be anything you want to be. - And, sure, Ravage, I can craft him a good visor and battle mask."

His financial accounts suddenly pinged to warn him that all his funds were being transferred to the account of a mech named Soundwave. He sat bolt upright in the chair, certain his money was being stolen.

Ravage leaned forward, and pushed his head under Song's hand. He beamed a highly encrypted set of passwords and identification codes to Song, all belonging to this 'Soundwave.' He then followed this with a fairly innocuous history: 'Soundwave' was the lone survivor of a clan that had been decimated by cosmic rust vorns before. He'd grown up on the edges of civilized land, with a now-deceased energon miner as a guardian. The record implied excellent school work, high test scores, and included an offer of admission to the Iaconian Science Academy that had not been turned down by his guardian. Soundwave was ten vorns older than Song's actual age.

Song said quietly, "Soundwave?"

"Do you object?" Ravage asked, quietly, and in a rare moment of vocal speech. Fierce red optics studied him from under Song's hand. "I had to act quickly. The name can be changed. Many mecha rename themselves when they leave home and go to a university."

"Name: acceptable." It suited him better than Song had.

Scour stood up and slapped Song - Soundwave - on the shoulder. "You can recharge in my back office tonight. Both of you. I think you two need to have a long discussion."

Song - Soundwave, he reminded himself of his new designation - leaned against the wall and regarded Ravage with unexpected apprehension. The old cybercat sat on his haunches, head tilted as he listened for Scour's departure. When the exterior door clicked shut, Ravage visibly relaxed. They were alone.

"Scour: Friend." Soundwave said, for lack of anything else to say. He wasn't good at emotional moments.

Ravage padded closer, so close that Soundwave could feel the heat from his systems. Then Ravage was actually in his lap, moving carefully so as to not jostle his still healing leg. Ravage leaned against Soundwave's chest, tucking his head under Soundwave's chin, and said, :I chose you. If you will have me. If you want me.:

"Why wouldn't I want you?" He whispered, scarcely believing that Ravage was his.

:Link with me, and then decide,: Ravage sounded sad, somehow, and his spark was radiating fear. However, he pressed closer to Soundwave's plating. There was a click as Ravage's data ports slid open and a softer snick as the tightly engineered locks on his spark chamber disengaged.

"I've never done this before ..." he whispered, awed, as golden spark light filled the room.

Ravage pressed his forehead to Soundwave's shoulder. :Well, I promise I won't bite you.:

He laughed softly, tension dissipating. Ravage's shoulders shook in a silent chuckle as well.

Hesitantly, he extended his cables and plugged in to Ravage's data ports. The meeting of their minds was almost automated by deep seated code. He simply changed a few permissions and gave Ravage access to his processor via some closely guarded firewalls. This took deep trust to do - Ravage could have hacked him in an instant, particularly given his level of skill - but he trusted the symbiont to the very core of his spark.

Ravage likewise, dropped his own barriers. There was more hesitation on Ravage's part, and, Soundwave noted, far more defensive firewalls. However, Ravage gave him complete access, baring everything and hiding nothing.

He'd been coerced to bond the last time, Soundwave recalled. He ran a hand down Ravage's powerful back, soothingly. He caught a flash of fear strong enough to make Soundwave's own plating lift up, and could feel growing tension in the cybercat's wiry frame.

"What are you afraid of?" He whispered.

"So much ..." Ravage responded, claws curling into the seams of Soundwave's armor.

"Tell me?"

"Show you." Ravage's chest armor slid aside, baring the brilliant gold of his spark.

There was nothing sexual in this bonding. Someday, Soundwave knew he might find a mate and bond in a similar - yet very different - way with a mate. He wondered, suddenly, if Ravage had ever had a bonded lover. He hadn't asked. Surely, the cybercat had lovers, however, and Soundwave found himself briefly embarrassed at the thought of knowing the details of those trysts.

Ravage had followed that thought; he was watching Soundwave's mind even as his spark swirled with fear. "Primus, you're so young. And I had a bonded lover once. She wasn't carrier kin, and in the end she couldn't handle my relationship with my master. I had to chose ..."

"You chose your master?"

"He offered to let me go. She wouldn't." Ravage bumped Soundwave's chest with his nose. "I stayed with the bondmate who cared more about my own spark than his grief at my loss."

"I'm sorry." He thought he'd chose the same - to let Ravage go.

A low chuckle, and a lessening of fear, greeted those thoughts. "You are young, but you are worthy."

"You are scared. Tell me why, before we go any farther." He would need to bare his spark to Ravage, and to link his very self on a quantum level with the cat. Why was Ravage so worried?

"You are young, and I am not." Ravage looked up at him, crimson eyes glowing in the dark of the room. Soundwave shifted a little, supporting Ravage's frame better so Ravage could lean back and see his expression. "You will see everything I am."

"And you will see I am a youngling. Inexperienced. Uneducated. Naive, my sire says."

The golden glow of Ravage's spark cast flickering shadows as he moved slightly. "I have done things you cannot even imagine, youngling. I need your youth, your belief in justice and in our oldest laws. I need you to remind me that there are ways other than war and killing and death, and that there are people who do not steal, rape, lie and bully their way through life. I need you, Soundwave. I need what you are. I need what you will be. I need you to remind me of what I can be."

He understood, then, feeling both the fear and the hope in the old cybercat's emotions. Ravage found his very youth and idealism an asset. But Soundwave was afraid that Song, young and idealistic, would reject him because he done so many terrible things in his life.

Soundwave couldn't imagine rejecting the cat who he was holding so tightly in his arms. Soundwave slowly, nervously, parted his armor. His symbiont docks, never before used, folded aside and behind it, his spark chamber opened.

When their sparks merged, what had been faint and ghostly emotions were suddenly as real as his own. His imagination and his limited empathic talents had not truly told him how scared Ravage was, how alone, or how desperately and bitterly angry he had been at his late master. The mech had stolen him away from a life he'd loved. He had been working with scientists and explorers as a free mech, respected and valued as part of the crew. He had admired the ship's captain to the point of wishing the mech had been a carrier, and he had an ill-concealed and unrequited crush of a very different kind on the ship's engineer, a fiesty minibot. The crew of a dozen others had been his friends, allies, coworkers, and colleagues. The ship had been his home and he wanted desperately to return to it.

Perhaps we can, if they'll have me, he thought. Or I can let you go when they come.

I'm not letting you go! Ravage's response was fierce, possessive, and a bit indignant. If we want to rejoint the crew, you will need to study hard and gain some new skills, but when they return to port, I hope they will be able to find positions for both of us. We can discuss plans for our future later, however.

More of Ravage's past - memories, thoughts, feelings, swirled around him. It was overpowering, intoxicating, overwhelming, In comparison, he had little to tell or show. He realized just how young he was and how limited his experience was as Ravage's spark bonded with his own.

:I am just a child.: He couldn't shake that thought, as memories that were not his own filled his processor. :I am no adult. How can I be your master, Ravage? You are so, so much older than I am.:

Ravage's entire self seemed to collapse in relief and a strange sense of exhaustion as the bond took hold. He'd been alone - even bonded to his last late master, he'd been alone - for too long. There was utter acceptance from Ravage, which shocked him to his very core.

"But I am a child!" He was scared of behaving foolishly, and not having the experience needed to be Ratchet's master.

The mental equivalent of a snort came from his symbiont. :Kid, if you act like an idiot, I'll tell you. Believe me, I'm an opinionated old aft when I need to be.:

He liked that Ravage was an 'opinionated aft.'

His gaze met a pair of tired red optics as Ravage pushed himself away from Soundwave's spark. Even though this motion parted their sparks a strong bond remained. He could feel Ravage's weariness - and his own trembling exhaustion.

:You have the strength of character, and the belief in our ways, to remind me of what I should be.: Ravage's voice murmured deep into the very essence of Soundwave's being. :The rest … will work itself out.:

Their spark chambers spiraled closed, but the sense of Ravage remained within his spark.

Ravage was fierce, a force to be reckoned with, but Soundwave had no fear of him. He could feel Ravage's willingness to be a partner.

He had been innocent, naive even. He'd trusted too much in the laws of his clan, and in the goodness of his elders. He had learned a hard lesson today, but he'd also gotten Ravage out of the mess. He reached up and stroked the side of Ravage's head with his hand. The cat leaned into the touch, simple pleasure filling his spark. Soundwave could feel Ravage's enjoyment at the caress on a spark deep level, and he reacted with happiness of his own. Had he ever been afraid to touch Ravage, for fear of the cat's reaction? Now, he couldn't imagine not stroking the cat's plating. It clearly gave Ravage deep pleasure to be caressed by his master.

Ravage tapped Soundwave's carrier bay door with one talon. :Tired,: he said, simply.

Soundwave had never carried a symbiont before in his life. He found the command to open the door, and with expert skill, Ravage flipped himself inside and transformed into a compact rectangular docking mode in the same instant.

He could feel Ravage's systems docking with his. Since he hadn't gotten his adult upgrades, however, he didn't have the drivers he needed to sync properly. Ravage calmly said, :Drop your firewalls, master. I've got the code you need.:

He had no fear of doing so. Ravage swiftly accessed the core programming of his CPU, added several dozen drivers then said, :Your antivirus innoculations are out of date. Do you mind if I update them?:

:Permission granted.:

Ravage swiftly added some very advanced antivirus code - it was tagged as being military in origin, though when Soundwave reviewed it, it seemed to have been modified by someone to be carrier specific.

:It's from my third master. He was special ops. He was a very good at code ... I'll unpack some of the lessons I learned from him and let you see the data and memories later. You're actually more analytically minded than he was. I can't wait to see what you can do with a proper education and some code upgrades, Soundwave. You have so much more potential than anyone has ever appreciated.:

Ravage finished up by changing a few permissions - and then he gave Soundwave direct access to his motor functions and memory files.

:Why ...?: Soundwave questioned the seemingly invasive set up.

:If you abuse it, I'll break the bond with you.: Ravage seemed amused by Soundwave's surprise. :But you've got access to my motor functions now so you can transform me and tuck me away in safety if I'm knocked out in a fight. As far as my memories ... I am very, very old, Soundwave. I can't share all that I am in one merge, or even many. You have a right to know my history, and you will learn from it. You are my master. You have a right to see my past, as I lived it.:

Had Ravage not been tucked away in his chest, he would have hugged the cat closely. Never had he expected to bond with a symbiont like the cybercat.

:Anyway, you're a kid. You need all the life experience I can give you.:

:I am not a child!: he protested.

Ravage snickered across their newly forged bond. :You protest too much. It is amusing. And now, I believe I need to power down for a good long defrag. I suggest you do the same. Our systems will sync up further as we recharge.:

:I ... yes. Of course.: He was tired, and moreover, he could feel Ravage's exhaustion.

The cat's systems began to shut down. Ravage's power plant idled, and he made an electrical connection to Soundwave's far more efficient systems. Soundwave felt coolant and energon lines plug in to Ravage's ports, and a head's up display he'd never seen before displayed Ravage's health status. His new symbiont, it turned out, was short on a number of trace elements to the point of malnutrition and needed a number of lubricant reservoirs flushed and refilled. One of his cooling fans needed the bearings repacked, and a coolant valve was so worn that it was grinding painfully every time it opened or shut. Ravage had given no sign of any of these issues.

:My last master skimped on my care.:

:How could he?: Soundwave said, in shock. He wanted to go out right now and get the parts and supplies needed to fix the problem. He envisioned spending hours painstakingly tuning and repairing Ravage's neglected systems.

Ravage's spark responded to the idea with a pulse of sleepy pleasure. It turned out his symbiont enjoyed being fussed over and detailed. His third master had spent long periods of time simply polishing Ravage's armor and obsessing over his maintenance. Ravage, when he was feeling particularly lonely, or grieving that long lost and much beloved mech, had often treated himself to expensive detailing. It wasn't about the end results - he wasn't particularly vain - but the detailing had reminded him of a time when he had been beloved by another.

His last master had stopped Ravage's beauty shop habit, stating it was too expensive. (Even though Ravage had, initially, had ample funds in his own savings ... the carrier had eventually managed to convince a bank to transfer the funds to his own accouont.) He had also refused to handle Ravage's detailing and all but the most basic maintenance himself.

Ravage was absolutely starved for physical contact and pampering. Soundwave started making a list, then and there, of products and equipment to buy. He loved Ravage, and would do anything to make his symbiont happy.

Soundwave tucked his knees to his chest and wrapped his arms around himself. He could feel the low hum of Ravage's systems in his chest as Ravage finished his power-down. The symbiont's autorepair began to make some minor repairs to damage from the fight. There was a draw on Soundwave's systems as this happened. As was normal for a symbiont, Ravage was using Soundwave's energon and his protoform reserves for the repairs. It was a good feeling, to provide for the cybercat in such a way.

:Ravage, I love you.:

There was no answer from the cat. Ravage had slipped into a deep, trusting recharge.

Soundwave leaned back against the wall, folded his arms over his chest, and shuttered his optics. He hurt, and was more than ready for a long recharge himself. However, he could feel a remarkable emotion coming from his cybercat.

Security. Trust. Relaxation.

The cybercat felt safe with him.

He reopened his optics, and put his hand gently over his chest. He would wait until they were safely out of his father's territory to rest. In the meantime, he could remain awake and alert so that Ravage stayed safe.

Trust.

Ravage wasn't the only one who trusted. Soundwave's spark expanded with emotion itself: Trust, Love, Respect, Admiration.

He stroked a hand over the closed door to his symbiont docks. Ravage was safe within his chassis, and that was enough for now. He didn't know what his future held, but as long as Ravage was a part of it, the rest would sort itself out.


End file.
